But he said to keep on hoping, that it was the best news we had had.

And in the meantime, consumed with anxiety as we were, things were

happening at the house in rapid succession.

We had one peaceful day--then Liddy took sick in the night. I went in

when I heard her groaning, and found her with a hot-water bottle to her

face, and her right cheek swollen until it was glassy.

"Toothache?" I asked, not too gently. "You deserve it. A woman of

your age, who would rather go around with an exposed nerve in her head

than have the tooth pulled! It would be over in a moment."

"So would hanging," Liddy protested, from behind the hot-water bottle.

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I was hunting around for cotton and laudanum.

"You have a tooth just like it yourself, Miss Rachel," she whimpered.

"And I'm sure Doctor Boyle's been trying to take it out for years."

There was no laudanum, and Liddy made a terrible fuss when I proposed

carbolic acid, just because I had put too much on the cotton once and

burned her mouth. I'm sure it never did her any permanent harm;

indeed, the doctor said afterward that living on liquid diet had been a

splendid rest for her stomach. But she would have none of the acid,

and she kept me awake groaning, so at last I got up and went to

Gertrude's door. To my surprise, it was locked.

I went around by the hall and into her bedroom that way. The bed was

turned down, and her dressing-gown and night-dress lay ready in the

little room next, but Gertrude was not there. She had not undressed.

I don't know what terrible thoughts came to me in the minute I stood

there. Through the door I could hear Liddy grumbling, with a squeal

now and then when the pain stabbed harder. Then, automatically, I got

the laudanum and went back to her.

It was fully a half-hour before Liddy's groans subsided. At intervals

I went to the door into the hall and looked out, but I saw and heard

nothing suspicious. Finally, when Liddy had dropped into a doze, I

even ventured as far as the head of the circular staircase, but there

floated up to me only the even breathing of Winters, the night

detective, sleeping just inside the entry. And then, far off, I heard

the rapping noise that had lured Louise down the staircase that other

night, two weeks before. It was over my head, and very faint--three or

four short muffled taps, a pause, and then again, stealthily repeated.

The sound of Mr. Winters' breathing was comforting; with the thought

that there was help within call, something kept me from waking him. I

did not move for a moment; ridiculous things Liddy had said about a

ghost--I am not at all superstitious, except, perhaps, in the middle of

the night, with everything dark--things like that came back to me.

Almost beside me was the clothes chute. I could feel it, but I could

see nothing. As I stood, listening intently, I heard a sound near me.

It was vague, indefinite. Then it ceased; there was an uneasy movement

and a grunt from the foot of the circular staircase, and silence again.




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